Rare earth oxides are used in the x-ray detector industry due to their stability, high density, and high atomic number. However, they have generally been limited to small area detectors due to manufacturing limitations. The present industry standard scintillator for x-ray detection is cesium iodide doped with tantalum (CsI:Tl). In terms of optical and scintillation properties, CsI:Tl has good transparency, a density of 4.51 g/cc, and emits ˜60,000 photons per MeV of incident x-rays [1]. Lutetium Oxide doped with Europium Oxide (Lu2O3:Eu) has been studied as an alternative to CsI:Tl, because its high density and high atomic number make it an ideal scintillator. Lu2O3:Eu has a highly transparent body-centered cubic (BCC) crystal structure, a density of 9.4 g/cc, and it emits ˜30,000 photons per MeV [2].
Current manufacturing methods, such as sintering and hot pressing, produce a transparent 2-3 mm thick disc that must be ground and polished to a thickness close to the desired thickness. In order to reduce light scattering, the disc must then be pixelized as shown in FIG. 1 using a highly labor intensive laser ablation process. The top surface is then placed onto a CCD camera using optical glue, and the back is ground off [1]. Use of Lu2O3:Eu scintillators in dentistry, which is one of the potential applications for such a material, would require a ceramic detector of approximately 200 microns thickness in order to absorb most of the incoming x-rays, compared to 2 mm thickness for CsI. With current fabrication technology, this is not commercially viable, due to the required processing. There is a need for improved methods of manufacturing Lu2O3:Eu scintillator material that would be more efficient, less labor intensive, and more suitable to produce large area scintillators than with currently available techniques.